SEMESTER – V

INTRODUCTION TO
COMPOSITE MATERIALS
Subject Code 15AE52 IA Marks 20
Number of Lecture 04 Exam Hours 03
Hours/Week
Total Number of 50 Exam Marks 80
Lecture Hours

Department of Aeronautical Engineering

MVJCE, Bangalore
Course Objectives:
This course will enable students to
Understand the advantages of composite
materials compared to conventional
materials
Evaluate the properties of polymer matrix
composites with fiber reinforcements
Explain the manufacturing process and
applications of composite materials

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Course Outcomes:
After studying this course, students will be able to:
 Explain the advantages of using composite
materials as an alternative to conventional
materials for specific applications
 Describe the advanced fabrication and
processing for producing composite parts.
 Evaluate the micro- and macro-mechanical
behavior of composite laminates

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 Definition
• A Composite material (Composition
Material) It is a material made from two or
more constituent materials with
significantly different physical or chemical
properties.

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Why we need to Study Composites
KEY FACTORS INFLUENCING THE USE OF COMPOSITES

CIVIL Structural Performance,

AIRCRAFT Cost Safety, Regulation
Compliances, Fuel
Economy
MILITARY Structural Performance,
AIRCRAFT Weight, Assembly and
Maintainance
HELICOPTER Multifunctional design,
S Superior Fatigue
properties

SPACE Light weight design, Low

APPLICATIO response of thermal
NS variation.
Composite usage over the years in commercial Aircraft
industry
0-5 % 5-8% 8-12% 12-30% 30-50% 50-70% 70-80%
1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020-
2030
31-Oct-19
Classification of Composite

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 Composite Survey
Composites

Particle-reinforced Fiber-reinforced Structural

Large- Dispersion- Continuous Discontinuous Laminates Sandwich

particle strengthened (aligned) (short) panels

Aligned Randomly
oriented Adapted from Fig.
16.2, Callister 7e.

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 Applications
• Applications:
– Aerospace industry
– Sporting Goods Industry
– Automotive Industry
– Home Appliance Industry

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 Advantages & Disadvantages of Composites
ADVANTAGES
 Light Weight - Composites are light in weight, compared to most metals. Their lightness is
important in aircraft, where less weight means better fuel efficiency (more miles to the
gallon).
 Strength Related to Weight ratio is high - Strength-to-weight ratio is a material’s strength
in relation to how much it weighs. Some materials are very strong and heavy, such as steel.
Composite materials can be designed to be both strong and light. This property is why
composites are used to build airplanes—which need a very high strength material at the
lowest possible weight.
 Corrosion Resistance - Composites resist damage from the weather and from harsh
chemicals that can eat away at other materials. Outdoors, they stand up to severe weather and
wide changes in temperature.
 Design Flexibility - Composites can be molded into complicated shapes more easily than
most other materials. This gives designers the freedom to create almost any shape or form.
 Part Consolidation - A single piece made of composite materials can replace an entire
assembly of metal parts. Reducing the number of parts in a machine or a structure saves time
and cuts down on the maintenance needed over the life of the item.
 Dimensional Stability - Composites retain their shape and size when they are hot or cool, wet
or dry. They are used in aircraft wings, for example, so that the wing shape and size do not
change as the plane gains or loses altitude.
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 Radar Transparent - Radar signals pass right through composites, a property that
makes composites ideal materials for use anywhere radar equipment is operating,
whether on the ground or in the air. Composites play a key role in stealth aircraft,
such as the U.S. Air Force’s B-2 stealth bomber, which is nearly invisible to radar.
 Durable - Structures made of composites have a long life and need little
maintenance. We do not know how long composites last, because we have not
come to the end of the life of many original composites. Many composites have
been in service for half a century.
DISADVANTAGES
 Delamination - Since composites are often constructed of different ply layers into a
laminate structure, they can "delaminate" between layers where they are weaker.
 High Cost - They are a relatively new material, and as such have a high cost.
 Complex Fabrication - The fabrication process is usually labor intensive and
complex, which further increases cost.
 Damage inspection - Delamination and cracks in composites are mostly internal
and hence require complicated inspection techniques for detection.
 It is not recyclable material

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 Particulate Composites
 A Composite consist of Tiny particles of one material embedded in
another material.
Concrete being a good example
 There are many different forms of particulate composites. The
particulates can be very small particles (< 0.25 microns), chopped
fibers (such as glass), platelets, hollow spheres, or new materials
such as bucky balls or carbon nano-tubes. In each case, the
particulates provide desirable material properties and the matrix acts
as binding medium necessary for structural applications.

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 Particulate Composite
Uses in Industry
The most common particulate composite materials are reinforced plastics
which are used in a variety of industries.
 Automotive
Glass reinforced plastics are used in many automotive applications
including body panels, bumpers, dashboards, and intake manifolds. Brakes
are made of particulate composite composed of carbon or ceramics
particulates.
 Consumer Products
Many of the plastic components we use in daily life are reinforced in some
way. Appliances, toys, electrical products, computer housings, cell phone
casings, office furniture, helmets, etc. are made from particulate reinforced
plastics.
 BENEFITS
• Improved material properties
• Tailored material properties
• Manufacturing flexibility
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 Advantages of Particulate Composites
High Tensile Strength at Elevated
Temperature
High Toughness
High Strength to Weight Ratio
High Creep Resistence

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 Fiber
Particle-reinforced Fiber-reinforced Structural

• Fibers themselves are very strong

– Provide significant strength improvement to
material
– Ex: fiber-glass
• Continuous glass filaments in a polymer matrix
• Strength due to fibers
• Polymer simply holds them in place and
environmentally protects them
 Fiber Alignment

aligned aligned random

continuous discontinuous
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Behavior under load for Fibers &
Matrix

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 Types of Fibers Used in Composites

Glass Fiber
Carbon Fiber
Kevlar Fiber
Boron Fiber
Natural Fiber
Hybrid Fiber

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 Glass Fiber
 E-Glass :- The Most Popular and Inexpensive, E Implies
Electrical insulator
 S-Glass :- Stronger than E-glass Fibers, S stands for
Strength.
 C-Glass :- Corrosion and Chemical Resistant Glass fiber

The Most Popular matrix material for Fiber is Thermosets.

Fiber glass materials have laminate structures with different
orientations in the reinforcing glass layers

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Fiber glass are categorized by following
properties
 High Strength to weight ratio
 High modulus to elasticity
 Good corrosion resistance
 Good insulating properties
 Low thermal resistance
 Fiber glass materials are used for manufacturing
Boat hulls, Marine structures, Automobile and
Truck Body Panels, Pressure Vessels, Aircraft
wings and Fuselage Sections, Housing for
Radar Systems, Swimming Pools, roofs, pipes
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Orientation of Fiber

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 Symmetric Laminates

• Laminates possessing symmetry of lamina

orientations about the geometric midplane

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 WHISKERS
• Whiskers are similar in diameter to fibers, but in general,
they are short and have low length‐to diameter ratios,
barely exceeding a few hundreds. Thus, the difference in
mechanical properties of a whisker. This is because the
degree of perfection in whiskers is even higher that in
fibers.
• Whiskers are produced by crystallizing materials on a
very small scale.
• Internal alignment within each whisker is extremely high.

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 long fibers composites.
• Long-fiber-reinforced thermoplastic (LFRTs) is a type
of easily mouldable thermoplastic used to create a
variety of components used primarily in the automotive
industry. LFRTs are one of the fastest growing
categories in thermoplastic technologies
• LFRTs differ from the composite structures used in the
aerospace industry for components such as aircraft
parts. The fibers in LFRTs are relatively short (6.35
mm/0.25 in. or greater) compared to the fibres contained
in composite aircraft components. High performance
composites usually contain fibers as long as the
component itself (6 metres or longer)
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 Polymer Matrix Composites
• PMCs are very popular due to their low cost and simple
fabrication methods. Reinforcement of polymers by
strong fibrous network permits fabrication of PMCs,
• There are many different polymers available depending
upon the starting raw ingredients.
• The most common are known as polyester, vinyl ester,
epoxy, phenolic, polyimide, polyamide, polypropylene,
polyether ether ketone (PEEK), and others.
• The reinforcement materials are often fibers but can also
be common ground minerals.
• 60% resin and 40% fiber,
• vacuum infusion gives a final product with 40% resin
and 60% fiber content. The strength of the product is
greatly dependent on this MVJCE
ratio
PMC are Categorized by
a) High specific strength
b) High specific stiffness
c) High fracture resistance
d) Good abrasion resistance
e) Good impact resistance
f) Good corrosion resistance
g) Good fatigue resistance
h) Low cost

The main disadvantages of PMCs are

a) low thermal resistance and
b) high coefficient of thermal expansion.

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 Ceramic matrix composites
• Ceramic matrix composites are materials in which one or
more distinct ceramic phases are intentionally added to
another, in order to enhance some property that is not
possessed by the monolithic ceramic materials.
• Ceramic matrix composites (CMCs) are a breakthrough
materials technology for jet engines
• CMCs will replace certain metal components in the hot
section of the engine.
• CMCs is that they can be made as strong as metal, yet
are much lighter and can withstand much higher
temperatures. These advantages will help us lower fuel
burn and emissions, while increasing the efficiency of
future aircraft engine platforms.
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 Advantages of ceramic matrix
composites
a) Excellent wear and corrosion resistance in a
wide range of environments and temperatures
b) Higher strength to weight ratio
c) Higher strength retention at elevated
temperature
d) Higher chemical stability
e) Non-catastrophic failure
f) High hardness
g) Lightweight
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 Disadvantages of ceramic
matrix composites
a) Processing routes for CMCs involve high temperatures –
can only be employed with high temperature
reinforcements
(b) The main disadvantage of which is brittleness
c) High processing temperature results in complexity in
manufacturing and hence expensive processing
d) Difference in the coefficients of thermal expansion
between the matrix and the reinforcement lead to
thermal stresses on cooling from the processing
temperatures

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 Applications
• Ceramic matrix composites overcome the major demerits (such as
brittle failure, low fracture toughness and limited thermal shock
resistance) of monolithic ceramics
• Production of cutting tools which are made up of SiC whisker
reinforced aluminium oxide for machining of hard to machine
materials.
• ceramic matrix composites are widely used in several engineering
applications such as in heat shield systems, gas turbines
components (combustion chambers, stator vanes and turbine
blades), rocket engines, components for burners, flame holders, hot
gas ducts, brake disks and brake system components for airplanes
or cars which experience extreme thermal shock, bearing
components that necessitate high corrosion and wear resistance.

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 MMC WITH PARTICULATE COMPOSITES
• Metal matrix composites provide significantly en-hanced
properties like higher strength, stiffness and weight
savings in comparison to conventional monolithic
materials.
• Particle reinforced MMCs are attractive due to their cost-
effectiveness, isotropic properties, and their ability to be
processed using similar technology used for monolithic
materials
• This class of composites is most widely used composites
mainly because they are widely available and cheap.
• They are again two kinds: dispersion-strengthened and
particulate- reinforced composites.
• These two classes are distinguishable based upon
strengthening mechanism – dispersion-strengthened
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composites and particulate composites.
• In dispersion-strengthened composites, particles are
comparatively smaller, and are of 0.01-0.1μm in size.
Here the strengthening occurs at atomic/molecular level
• Examples: thoria (ThO2) dispersed Ni-alloys (TD Ni-
alloys) with high-temperature strength; SAP (sintered
aluminium powder) – where aluminium matrix is
dispersed with extremely small flakes of alumina
(Al2O3).

Dispersed Particulate Composite

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• Particulate composites are other class of particle-
reinforced composites. These contain large amounts of
comparatively coarse particles. These composites are
designed to produce unusual combinations of properties
rather than to improve the strength. Mechanical
properties, such as elastic modulus, of particulate
composites achievable are in the range defined by rule
of mixtures

Particulate composites

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where E and V denote elastic modulus and volume
fractions respectively while c, m, and p represent
composite, matrix and particulate phases.

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 Particulate composites are used with all three material
types – metals, polymers and ceramics. Cermets contain
hard ceramic particles dispersed in a metallic matrix.
Eg.: tungsten carbide (WC) or titanium carbide (TiC)
embedded cobalt or nickel used to make cutting tools.
 Polymers are frequently reinforced with various
particulate materials such as carbon black. When added
to vulcanized rubber, carbon black enhances toughness
and abrasion resistance of the rubber.
 Aluminium alloy castings containing dispersed SiC
particles are widely used for automotive applications
including pistons and brake applications.
 Concrete is most commonly used particulate composite.
It consists of cement as binding medium and finely
dispersed particulates of gravel in addition to fine
aggregate (sand) and water. It is also known as Portland
cement concrete. Its strength
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additional reinforcement such as steel rods/mesh.
 Fiber Reinforced MMC

Fibre-reinforced composites have certain distinct advantages

over their particle- reinforced counterparts. Most of the high-
strength, high-stiffness materials fail because of Propagation
of flaws.
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• Length of fibers, their orientation and volume fraction in
addition to direction of external load application affects
the mechanical properties of these composites.

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 TECHNIQUES FOR FABRICATION OF METAL
MATRIX COMPOSITES

• Various processes are used to manufacture MMCs

which are described here. These processes are
classified on the basis of temperature of the metallic
matrix during processing Accordingly, the processes can
be classified into five categories:
(1) liquid-phase processes
(2) solid–liquid processes,
(3) deposition techniques
(4) in situ processes.
(5) two- phase (solid–liquid) processes.

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 Liquid State Fabrication of Metal Matrix
Composites
• It involves incorporation of dispersed phase into a molten
matrix metal, followed by its solidification.
• In order to provide high level of mechanical properties of
the composite, good interfacial bonding (wetting)
between the dispersed phase and the liquid matrix
should be obtained.
• Proper coating not only reduces interfacial energy, but
also prevents chemical interaction between the
dispersed phase and the matrix.
• The methods of liquid state fabrication of Metal Matrix
Composites: Stir casting, Infiltration like gas pressure
infiltration , Squeeze casting infiltration or Pressure die
infiltration.
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 Stir Casting
• It is a liquid state method of composite materials
fabrication
• In which a dispersed phase (ceramic particles,
short fibers) is mixed with a molten matrix metal
by means of mechanical stirring.
• Stir casting as shown in fig is the simplest and
the most cost effective method of liquid state
fabrication.
• The liquid composite material is then cast by
conventional casting methods and may also be
processed by conventional Metal forming
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 Infiltration
• It is a liquid state method of composite materials
fabrication,
• In which a preformed dispersed phase (ceramic
particles, fibers, woven) is soaked in a molten
matrix metal, which fills the space between the
dispersed phase inclusions.
• The motive force of an infiltration process may
be either capillary force of the dispersed phase
(spontaneous infiltration) or an external pressure
(gaseous, mechanical, electromagnetic,
centrifugal or ultrasonic) applied to the liquid
matrix phase (forced infiltration).
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 Gas Pressure Infiltration
• It is a forced infiltration method of liquid phase fabrication
of Metal Matrix Composites, using a pressurized gas for
applying pressure on the molten metal and forcing it to
penetrate into a preformed dispersed phase as shown in
fig Gas Pressure Infiltration method is used for
manufacturing large composite parts.

Gas Pressure Infiltration

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 Solid State Fabrication of Metal Matrix
Composites

• Solid state fabrication of metal matrix

composites is the process , in which MMC
are formed as a result of bonding of matrix
metal and dispersed phase due to mutual
diffusion occurring between them in solid
state at elevated temperature and under
pressure.

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 Diffusion Bonding
• It is a common solid-state processing technique for
joining similar or dissimilar metals. Inter diffusion of
atoms between clean metallic surfaces, in contact at an
elevated temperature, leads to bonding. It is also used
for fabrication of MMC

• The principal advantages of this technique are the ability

to process a wide variety of metal matrices and control of
fiber orientation and volume
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fraction.
Powder Processing or Powder Metallurgy
• These methods in conjunction with deformation
processing are used to fabricate particulate or short fiber
reinforced composites as shown in fig This typically
involves cold pressing and sintering, or hot pressing to
fabricate primarily particle- or whisker-reinforced MMCs.
The matrix and the reinforcement powders are blended
to produce a homogeneous distribution.

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• The blending stage is followed by cold
pressing to produce what is called a green
body, which is about 80% dense and can
be easily handled.
• The cold pressed green body is canned in
a sealed container and degassed to
remove any absorbed moisture from the
particle surfaces.
• The material is hot pressed, uniaxially or
isostatically, to produce a fully dense
composite and extruded.
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 Deposition Techniques
• Spray Forming
• Electroplating
• Spray Deposition
• Chemical Vapour Deposition (CVD)

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 Properties of MMCs
• Low Density,
• Mechanical Compatibility (A Thermal Expansion
Coefficient Which Is Low But
Adapted To The Matrix),
• Chemical Compatibility,
• Thermal Stability,
• High Young’s Modulus,
• High Compression And Tensile Strength,
• Good Processability
• Economic Efficiency

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